Apparently, what I'm getting from the 3 pages of discussion following my post, is that she is a deep, well developed character, with a sort natural expression of a blend of both typically masculine and feminine traits, without either being taken to an extreme.
As soon as you start talking about these, you've fallen into a trap.
??
What trap?
Accepting that gender is a thing that exists is sort of... non-third wave feminist. Except, it's actually accepting that gender is binary and that it is valuable for one to only display one set of traits.
It's a slightly complicated issue once you start wanting to account for and accept the needs of transgender people, while simultaneously saying that gender is a purely socially imposed standard.
edit:Bethryn did a good job of explaining this.
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GreasyKidsStuffMOMMM!ROAST BEEF WANTS TO KISS GIRLS ON THE TITTIES!Registered Userregular
Not really related the discussion as it stands right now (I'm having a hell of a time following any of it), I made the mistake of watching the Amazing Atheist's "rebbutal" of DiD Part 2.
Don't.... don't make the same mistake I did.
In all seriousness though, the entire video itself was Exhibit A in the argument for why Anita's videos are necessary. I'd actually recommend this article for that reason as well; while Anita's videos may not be the perfect, she's one voice of (hopefully) many, and if the end result is more people talking about it then we are all better off.
Not really related the discussion as it stands right now (I'm having a hell of a time following any of it), I made the mistake of watching the Amazing Atheist's "rebbutal" of DiD Part 2.
Don't.... don't make the same mistake I did.
In all seriousness though, the entire video itself was Exhibit A in the argument for why Anita's videos are necessary. I'd actually recommend this article for that reason as well; while Anita's videos may not be the perfect, she's one voice of (hopefully) many, and if the end result is more people talking about it then we are all better off.
But fuck the Amazing Atheist. He can shut up.
watching the amazing atheist and getting angry at him is exactly what he wants you to do
I can't rationalize how he feels so bitterly towards feminism while being so progressive on most issues, except that his feminism videos have a billion views so I think he's just doing what gets people to tune in and leave an angry comment against him or sexist comment in support of him
He's kind of like a leftist Rush Limbaugh. I like this comparison, because he's a lot like Rush Limbaugh
Bioshock Infinite was a game that addressed racism, colonialism, imperialism, American exceptionalism, the transition from becoming a girl to a woman, a young woman escaping an abusive relationship, and all sorts of progressive themes
Here is a visual representation of it's financial success:
*
*
In its first week of release, BioShock Infinite was the best-selling game on Steam's digital Top 10 PC Charts.[215] In the United States, BioShock Infinite was the top-selling console game for March 2013, with more than 878,000 units sold; these figures do not include digital sales such as through Steam.[216] During the first week of sales in the United Kingdom, BioShock Infinite debuted as the number one selling PC game, and the best-selling game on all available formats, topping the UK PC Retail Sales and the UK All Formats video games charts.[215][217][218] In the game's opening week in the UK, its Xbox 360 version ranked #1, PlayStation 3 version ranked #2, and the PC version ranked #9 in the UK Individual Formats video games charts, due to 64 percent of its sales being on the Xbox 360, 31 percent on the PlayStation 3, and 5 percent on PC.[218] As of April 2, 2013, it is currently the second biggest launch of 2013 in the UK after Tomb Raider, and is the biggest UK game launch in the BioShock franchise's history with approximately 9000 more sales than BioShock 2.[217][218][219] During the game's second week in the UK, despite a 75 percent drop in sales, BioShock Infinite maintained its lead in the UK All Formats charts.[220] In its third week, Infinite became the first 2013 game to top the UK charts for three weeks in a row.[221] Take Two reported that the game has shipped 3.7 million copies to retail by their May 2013 financial report.[222]
So why is it that adding progressive elements to a game is a DEATH KNELL that will force the AMERICAN TAX PAYERS to OPEN THEIR WALLETS
I agree with you Cass, but if you look at how Bioshock Infinite was marketed it appears that Booker is the rugged male action hero saving poor elizabeth from being hanged by the angry villages and scary monsters
Basically I'm completely okay with Kevin Levine agreeing to mismarket the game to get it into more homes.
Edit: the problem is that even when they try to do gender neutral marketing they tend to suck at it because they still use focus groups of frat boys and the guys in the offices doing the marketing are almost all white males
It's like the car companies until recently never considered a female perspective when designing a car and are only now starting to figure out "hey all of our designers are white men but more than 50% of our customers are women this is a problem"
Sure, but it's not like the game went out and people went "THEY TRICKED US!" and threw a fit. It's also not like they put Elizabeth in the cover, leaning forward, tits out, being like "oh come rescue me from my tower wiiiiink"
I'm okay with Infinite's marketing. It hit a good medium, where it was widely appealing without being sexist claptrap, and the themes in the game weren't anathema once they were revealed - in fact, they strengthened the support of the game
If the gaming industry needs to do the equivalent of blending broccoli into the brownie mix, I'm ok with it.
Here is the cover of Atelier Rorona:
and here is Rorona herself:
As you can see its not just one game which has the hold. The Atelier series continues to maintain a strong female character and also maintain, at least in Atelier Ayesha, the same DiD without it falling into her tropes.
Awww... how moe.
So, should there be some effort to segregate products of western culture and stuff that comes out of Japan? We have different tropes.
If you subscribe to the idea that there an inherently masculine and feminine traits, especially if you choose the traits that society currently throws onto most archetypes (males: strong, fearless, heroes through superior force; women: caring, nurturing, heroes through understanding), you're always going to end up with the problem that whenever a character of one sex has a trait that is usually ascribed to the other sex, you get the "but couldn't s/he just be written as a guy/woman?"
In my opinion, it makes far more sense when character/world-building to create societies that give rise to certain traits, so the character's traits are a function of their background than of their sex.
So for example, in a fantasy world, you can have a ritualistic 'Amazonian' tribe where female characters from this tribe tend to be dominant and forceful, and men are subservient; you can have a peaceful farming community where characters of both sexes tend to be relaxed and averse to violence; you can have a warring society constantly up against the wall with enemies, where only extremely harsh rules keep the society alive, and characters of this society tend to be unforgiving and short-tempered (this is basically Orzammar if you played DA).
It's one of the reasons why the recent Tomb Raider is so good; Lara starts out as a fairly normal person, with no particularly defining traits to either sex. Her growing in strength as the game progresses is because her environment is shaping her into an apex predator.
Woah, I just want to end discrimination, not demolish gender. I'd like to keep inherent traits around in my fantasy entertainment (and also I like your idea of environment guiding/forcing one's actions) because I take some comfort in the familiar. I say that as a straight, white male.
So, should there be some effort to segregate products of western culture and stuff that comes out of Japan? We have different tropes.
Anita's arguments fall on Mario and Zelda which aren't products of western culture, I think so please correct me if I'm wrong, which is why I wanted a list of games so it would be apparent where she would focus on and if there were, at least in my opinion, reasonable calls to her being a proponent of the "White Man's Burden" or simply address neo-colonialist thought on a culture which isn't hers.
Sorry.
My point what the material you chose sexualizes adolescents, which is pretty fucking not good.
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BethrynUnhappiness is MandatoryRegistered Userregular
Woah, I just want to end discrimination, not demolish gender. I'd like to keep inherent traits around in my fantasy entertainment (and also I like your idea of environment guiding/forcing one's actions) because I take some comfort in the familiar. I say that as a straight, white male.
It's not demolishing gender; it's establishing where you build it from (assuming you ascribe to the currently popular notion that gendered traits are a result of social expectations).
So the 'inherent' traits you speak of are just emergent traits that can easily be built by having a fairly typical society with the same problems as ours has.
...and of course, as always, Kill Hitler.
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ShivahnUnaware of her barrel shifter privilegeWestern coastal temptressRegistered User, Moderatormod
Woah, I just want to end discrimination, not demolish gender. I'd like to keep inherent traits around in my fantasy entertainment (and also I like your idea of environment guiding/forcing one's actions) because I take some comfort in the familiar. I say that as a straight, white male.
It's not demolishing gender; it's establishing where you build it from (assuming you ascribe to the currently popular notion that gendered traits are a result of social expectations).
So the 'inherent' traits you speak of are just emergent traits that can easily be built by having a fairly typical society with the same problems as ours has.
It's not exactly the same problems, but the same expectations that'd build most of those traits. You can get societies with wildly different problems but some of the same gendered traits, or different traits with the same problems, based on who is expected to be like what.
And to answer the question that you posted it does focus on the companies more than the people. Why aren't strong female leads, like in FFXIII, Atelier series, Mirror's Edge, and such being brought up as examples of strong female leads? Because they don't fit with her argument.
They are being brought up, many times within this thread. She is not bringing them up in the videos, which is my current biggest gripe with the videos. Her failure to bring them up doesn't make the point any less valid. Those 3 examples are great example of how it should be done, however it is very rarely done like that. Those types of characters need to be made much more often.
So, should there be some effort to segregate products of western culture and stuff that comes out of Japan? We have different tropes.
Anita's arguments fall on Mario and Zelda which aren't products of western culture, I think so please correct me if I'm wrong, which is why I wanted a list of games so it would be apparent where she would focus on and if there were, at least in my opinion, reasonable calls to her being a proponent of the "White Man's Burden" or simply address neo-colonialist thought on a culture which isn't hers.
Actually, while produced by a Japanese company, both of those series tend to focus more on Western iconography.
Arguing that Power Girl has a boob window because of [in-character reason] while ignoring that in fact as a fictional character her motivations are the product of a writing staff is a pretty silly thing to do.
It is possible to simultaneously support the right of actual women to wear whatever they want, and ask the all-male creative team why every female character is an ardent nudist. Because actual women have actual motivations, whereas fictional people only act in the manner that their writers want them to act. If they act in a certain manner, it doesn't just reflect them, it reflects the writer.
So Power Girl is a cool superhero with some great runs of comics about her and some interesting characterization, but if anyone in the comic asks her "why do you have a big window on your costume showing off your cleavage" the actual answer is "because this is presumed to appeal to a primarily male readership." Because it's a decision made without regard to characterization.
On the other hand, if you asked why Jack from Mass Effect didn't wear a shirt, she could respond in-character with some sort of "fuck you! I'm too extreme for clothes! I have sweet tattoooooooooos!" and it would actually make some sense. Actually, I'm pretty sure you can ask her and that's her basic response.
You can even have in-between examples, like how She-Hulk spent the Byrne run complaining to him about her outfits and how it made no sense for a lawyer to fight in a purple swimsuit. Or Empowered, I guess.
Anyway, the point is that if you ignore the actual reason something has happened in order to fanwank about how it could be justified you're being silly.
So, should there be some effort to segregate products of western culture and stuff that comes out of Japan? We have different tropes.
Anita's arguments fall on Mario and Zelda which aren't products of western culture, I think so please correct me if I'm wrong, which is why I wanted a list of games so it would be apparent where she would focus on and if there were, at least in my opinion, reasonable calls to her being a proponent of the "White Man's Burden" or simply address neo-colonialist thought on a culture which isn't hers.
Sorry.
My point what the material you chose sexualizes adolescents, which is pretty fucking not good.
Sorry I don't get that. Are you saying that the Atelier series sexualizes adolescents? I can see the spoliered image but I don't remember seeing a scene like that in the game or even knowing that there was a book out. I solely have the game so I was talking about that.
Yeah, I know. You have to understand what Japanese gamer/anime culture is about to pick up on instantly. Little things like why that image you posted is composed the way it is. What is in the middle of the frame? what does the little pendant draw attention to? It is meant to appeal to male japanese ephebophile gamers attracted to not overtly sexual girls (moe).
It is pretty much the same sort of male gaze+fantasy fulfillment as if you had posted a girl with double-E breasts hanging out of a bikini, it just has a different audience.
It is specifically the audience that created most of the material you see when you image search for Atelier Ayesha with safesearch off, and it's actually officially encouraged by the extra content in things like box sets.
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HacksawJ. Duggan Esq.Wrestler at LawRegistered Userregular
I think the fact that you cited those three specific leads in what is otherwise a sea of non-female strong leads is telling. They stand out precisely because there is a severe gender imbalance when it comes to leading protagonists. For all the Lara Crofts, Jades, and Terra Branfords, there are about a million of Nathan Drakes, Marcus Fenixes, and Duke Nukems who tip the scales waaaaay against them. It's a Real Thing.
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Nova_CI have the needThe need for speedRegistered Userregular
I think the fact that you cited those three specific leads in what is otherwise a sea of non-female strong leads is telling. They stand out precisely because there is a severe gender imbalance when it comes to leading protagonists. For all the Lara Crofts, Jades, and Terra Branfords, there are about a million of Nathan Drakes, Marcus Fenixes, and Duke Nukems who tip the scales waaaaay against them. It's a Real Thing.
I thought the point of the series was to go over the rampant sexism, not to say "Hey, it's all good, we get some token female leads."
I think Lara Croft being cited as an example of a strong female lead is hilarious, btw, as she was basically T&A for years.
And to answer the question that you posted it does focus on the companies more than the people. Why aren't strong female leads, like in FFXIII, Atelier series, Mirror's Edge, and such being brought up as examples of strong female leads? Because they don't fit with her argument.
They are being brought up, many times within this thread. She is not bringing them up in the videos, which is my current biggest gripe with the videos. Her failure to bring them up doesn't make the point any less valid. Those 3 examples are great example of how it should be done, however it is very rarely done like that. Those types of characters need to be made much more often.
I think her failure to do so is one of the biggest issues and makes her point less valid. Her thesis should look at all sides of the debate and then come up with a reasonable answer. Instead she cherry picks extremely useful arguments for her and ignores the ones which don`t fall into her spectrum of what she wants to talk about. If I did that for any Historical thesis papers I would surely get a talking to and possibly fail in the paper.
I'm telling you that she doesn't need to cherry pick. You can go on for hours and hours and hours naming different games that us the damsel in distress trope. In fact, she goes on for about a total of 48 minutes thus far doing it! I will agree that her videos suffer because she is not providing positive examples for people to build on, but that doesn't have a negative effect on the point she's trying to make, and the point that I am telling you right now: An extremely high number of games feature a damsel in distress, while an extremely low number feature a strong positive role model female hero.
FF13 and Mirror's Edge had great female leads, but those are just about the two exemplary ones. I'm sure you could sit there and think "well there's also X, and Y, and Z", you could do an exhaustive list of strong male vs strong female characters, and be surprised at how one-sided it is.
I think the fact that you cited those three specific leads in what is otherwise a sea of non-female strong leads is telling. They stand out precisely because there is a severe gender imbalance when it comes to leading protagonists. For all the Lara Crofts, Jades, and Terra Branfords, there are about a million of Nathan Drakes, Marcus Fenixes, and Duke Nukems who tip the scales waaaaay against them. It's a Real Thing.
I thought the point of the series was to go over the rampant sexism, not to say "Hey, it's all good, we get some token female leads."
I think Lara Croft being cited as an example of a strong female lead is hilarious, btw, as she was basically T&A for years.
Newer iterations of the series have been better in the "lets make Lara act and feel like a human being with human interests and human goals, versus being pixelated tits on a stick" department than the games of yore (this is entirely thanks to Crystal Dynamics). They're still, admittedly, not that great at some of the other, more ethereal gender-related stuff, but they're essentially miles and away better at it than most who blatantly drag gender issues into their games.
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Nova_CI have the needThe need for speedRegistered Userregular
So, should there be some effort to segregate products of western culture and stuff that comes out of Japan? We have different tropes.
Anita's arguments fall on Mario and Zelda which aren't products of western culture, I think so please correct me if I'm wrong, which is why I wanted a list of games so it would be apparent where she would focus on and if there were, at least in my opinion, reasonable calls to her being a proponent of the "White Man's Burden" or simply address neo-colonialist thought on a culture which isn't hers.
Sorry.
My point what the material you chose sexualizes adolescents, which is pretty fucking not good.
Sorry I don't get that. Are you saying that the Atelier series sexualizes adolescents? I can see the spoliered image but I don't remember seeing a scene like that in the game or even knowing that there was a book out. I solely have the game so I was talking about that.
Yeah, I know. You have to understand what Japanese gamer/anime culture is about to pick up on instantly. Little things like why that image you posted is composed the way it is. What is in the middle of the frame? what does the little pendant draw attention to? It is meant to appeal to male japanese ephebophile gamers attracted to not overtly sexual girls (moe).
It is pretty much the same sort of male gaze+fantasy fulfillment as if you had posted a girl with double-E breasts hanging out of a bikini, it just has a different audience.
It is specifically the audience that created most of the material you see when you image search for Atelier Ayesha with safesearch off, and it's actually officially encouraged by the extra content in things like box sets.
I see. Thank you for clarifying that.
But surely couldn't you then argue that these are part of Japanese culture, I don't know that I don't know the culture, and thus their mind set and views are different than what is acceptable anywhere else?
And by forcing one culture's views on another culture I think this sets up a very dangerous precedent on what can be targeted or not.
I don't follow this last bit. Who's forcing culture on who? Do you mean Japan on the west? Or vice versa?
Woah, I just want to end discrimination, not demolish gender. I'd like to keep inherent traits around in my fantasy entertainment (and also I like your idea of environment guiding/forcing one's actions) because I take some comfort in the familiar. I say that as a straight, white male.
It's not demolishing gender; it's establishing where you build it from (assuming you ascribe to the currently popular notion that gendered traits are a result of social expectations).
So the 'inherent' traits you speak of are just emergent traits that can easily be built by having a fairly typical society with the same problems as ours has.
I don't even really understand this worry.
If traits are inherent, how can there be any danger of demolishing gendered traits?
And yeah, I think that if you build a reasonably plausible society, recognizable traits should show up, because they're a response to the environment.
Bioshock Infinite was a game that addressed racism, colonialism, imperialism, American exceptionalism, the transition from becoming a girl to a woman, a young woman escaping an abusive relationship, and all sorts of progressive themes
Here is a visual representation of it's financial success:
*
*
In its first week of release, BioShock Infinite was the best-selling game on Steam's digital Top 10 PC Charts.[215] In the United States, BioShock Infinite was the top-selling console game for March 2013, with more than 878,000 units sold; these figures do not include digital sales such as through Steam.[216] During the first week of sales in the United Kingdom, BioShock Infinite debuted as the number one selling PC game, and the best-selling game on all available formats, topping the UK PC Retail Sales and the UK All Formats video games charts.[215][217][218] In the game's opening week in the UK, its Xbox 360 version ranked #1, PlayStation 3 version ranked #2, and the PC version ranked #9 in the UK Individual Formats video games charts, due to 64 percent of its sales being on the Xbox 360, 31 percent on the PlayStation 3, and 5 percent on PC.[218] As of April 2, 2013, it is currently the second biggest launch of 2013 in the UK after Tomb Raider, and is the biggest UK game launch in the BioShock franchise's history with approximately 9000 more sales than BioShock 2.[217][218][219] During the game's second week in the UK, despite a 75 percent drop in sales, BioShock Infinite maintained its lead in the UK All Formats charts.[220] In its third week, Infinite became the first 2013 game to top the UK charts for three weeks in a row.[221] Take Two reported that the game has shipped 3.7 million copies to retail by their May 2013 financial report.[222]
So why is it that adding progressive elements to a game is a DEATH KNELL that will force the AMERICAN TAX PAYERS to OPEN THEIR WALLETS
I agree with you Cass, but if you look at how Bioshock Infinite was marketed it appears that Booker is the rugged male action hero saving poor elizabeth from being hanged by the angry villages and scary monsters
Basically I'm completely okay with Kevin Levine agreeing to mismarket the game to get it into more homes.
Edit: the problem is that even when they try to do gender neutral marketing they tend to suck at it because they still use focus groups of frat boys and the guys in the offices doing the marketing are almost all white males
It's like the car companies until recently never considered a female perspective when designing a car and are only now starting to figure out "hey all of our designers are white men but more than 50% of our customers are women this is a problem"
Sure, but it's not like the game went out and people went "THEY TRICKED US!" and threw a fit. It's also not like they put Elizabeth in the cover, leaning forward, tits out, being like "oh come rescue me from my tower wiiiiink"
I'm okay with Infinite's marketing. It hit a good medium, where it was widely appealing without being sexist claptrap, and the themes in the game weren't anathema once they were revealed - in fact, they strengthened the support of the game
If the gaming industry needs to do the equivalent of blending broccoli into the brownie mix, I'm ok with it.
This is literally what happened with Darklands. Here is the cover:
Here is the in game art:
This is literally what I was saying in the quote Quid sigged.
It was a pretty neat cover just for catching a person's eye, because back then the folks likely to be interested in Darklands were the types who played or at least knew of D&D and other RPGs (tabletop or video game) and... well, female characters like that were usually the way art went back in the early days of this sort of thing.
And then Darklands turns out to be a game that is essentially gender neutral (man/women can be whatever and are just as good as each other- I remember the playthrough I did with my Dad had a totally badass female warrior with a brass handgun who threw all our potions for us. she was rad as you can get), in additon to being an incredibly good game.
I'm telling you that she doesn't need to cherry pick. You can go on for hours and hours and hours naming different games that us the damsel in distress trope. In fact, she goes on for about a total of 48 minutes thus far doing it! I will agree that her videos suffer because she is not providing positive examples for people to build on, but that doesn't have a negative effect on the point she's trying to make, and the point that I am telling you right now: An extremely high number of games feature a damsel in distress, while an extremely low number feature a strong positive role model female hero.
We can go one step better.
Go through your Steam/XBox/PSN list, and look at whether a) protagonist is male, and b) does it feature DiD?
For me:
Aliens Vs Predator: Y, Y
Amnesia: Y, N
Assassin's Creed: Y, N
Bastion: Y, N
Batman: Arkham Asylum: Y, Y
Beyond Good and Evil: N, ?
The Binding of Isaac: Y, N
Black Mesa: Y, N
Borderlands: n/a (3:1), N
CoD4: Y, Y
Chivalry: Y, N
CS: Y, N
Deus Ex: HR: Y, Y
Dragon Age II: n/a (1:1), Y
Skyrim: n/a (1:1), Y
Half-Life 2: Y, Y
Lara Croft &GoL: N, N
Left 4 Dead: n/a (3:1), N
Left 4 Dead 2: n/a (3:1), N
Limbo: Y, N
Metro 2033: Y, N
Metro Last Light: Y, Y
Monaco: n/a (3:1), Y
Monkey Island 1 & 2: Y, Y
Penny Arcade 1-2: n/a (1:1), N
Penny Arcade 3: Y, Y
PAYDAY: Y, N
Portal: N, N
Portal 2: N, Y
Prince of Persia 1-4: Y, N
RAGE: Y, N
STALKER: n/a (?), N
Sam & Max: Y, Y
Section 8: Y, N
Serious Sam 1-3: Y, N
TF2: Y, N
Terraria: n/a (1:1), N
Titan Quest: n/a (1:1), Y
To The Moon: n/a (1:1), N
Tomb Raider (Legend/Underworld): N, N
Tom Raider: N, Y
Torchlight: n/a (1:1), N
Vampire:tM: Bloodlines: n/a (1:1), Y
The Walking Dead: Y, Y
Witcher 2: Y, Y
This was skipping a few where it didn't make much sense, but what we see here is the following:
Of 54 games:
34 had male protagonists
7 had female protagonists
13 had a choice of sex (mostly 1:1, but in 4 cases a ratio of 3 male options to 1 female)
18 had Damsels in Distress in them.
...and of course, as always, Kill Hitler.
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Nova_CI have the needThe need for speedRegistered Userregular
So, should there be some effort to segregate products of western culture and stuff that comes out of Japan? We have different tropes.
Anita's arguments fall on Mario and Zelda which aren't products of western culture, I think so please correct me if I'm wrong, which is why I wanted a list of games so it would be apparent where she would focus on and if there were, at least in my opinion, reasonable calls to her being a proponent of the "White Man's Burden" or simply address neo-colonialist thought on a culture which isn't hers.
Sorry.
My point what the material you chose sexualizes adolescents, which is pretty fucking not good.
Sorry I don't get that. Are you saying that the Atelier series sexualizes adolescents? I can see the spoliered image but I don't remember seeing a scene like that in the game or even knowing that there was a book out. I solely have the game so I was talking about that.
Yeah, I know. You have to understand what Japanese gamer/anime culture is about to pick up on instantly. Little things like why that image you posted is composed the way it is. What is in the middle of the frame? what does the little pendant draw attention to? It is meant to appeal to male japanese ephebophile gamers attracted to not overtly sexual girls (moe).
It is pretty much the same sort of male gaze+fantasy fulfillment as if you had posted a girl with double-E breasts hanging out of a bikini, it just has a different audience.
It is specifically the audience that created most of the material you see when you image search for Atelier Ayesha with safesearch off, and it's actually officially encouraged by the extra content in things like box sets.
I see. Thank you for clarifying that.
But surely couldn't you then argue that these are part of Japanese culture, I don't know that I don't know the culture, and thus their mind set and views are different than what is acceptable anywhere else?
And by forcing one culture's views on another culture I think this sets up a very dangerous precedent on what can be targeted or not.
I don't follow this last bit. Who's forcing culture on who? Do you mean Japan on the west? Or vice versa?
I would say the West on Japan at this point. I haven't listed all of the games she refers to but if her main targets are Zelda and Mario then the question has to be raised at what point can a culture complain that "another culture is wrong and should only follow what my culture thinks is right"?
I think this is an important thing to discuss and as redx pointed out that certain things are targeted for their own audience, like certain aspects of the Moe culture which I have no idea what it is and am confused by the wiki description, which then get ported to another culture's area because the publishers think it will sell well.
Does this mean that once a foreign culture's product enter into another culture it can be criticized for not conforming? I would again say it brings a serious and dangerous precedent.
Being critical of another's culture sets a serious and dangerous precedent? You may want to try telling the Japanese that.
Besides, there isn't anything wrong with being critical of another country or culture. You yourself have been very critical of Canada's culture in the past, if I remember correctly. We may not agree with you, but no one has been so crass as to say you aren't permitted to be critical of Canada.
I would say the West on Japan at this point. I haven't listed all of the games she refers to but if her main targets are Zelda and Mario then the question has to be raised at what point can a culture complain that "another culture is wrong and should only follow what my culture thinks is right"?
Those games are very popular in the west. Gaming and anime culture isn't limited to Japan, it's an international element so when progressives discover its existence in the west they're going to clash with its conservative flaws.
I think this is an important thing to discuss and as redx pointed out that certain things are targeted for their own audience, like certain aspects of the Moe culture which I have no idea what it is and am confused by the wiki description, which then get ported to another culture's area because the publishers think it will sell well.
Does this mean that once a foreign culture's product enter into another culture it can be criticized for not conforming? I would again say it brings a serious and dangerous precedent.
Nothing groundbreaking here. Foreign cultures will judge one another, they're no getting around that.
I thought games already conformed before they reached our shelves. Alterations like putting clothes on the naked statues in a Castlevania game or editing the colors of Oil Man from Mega Man or removing the Muslim prayer from Ocarina of Time's Fire Temple. Happens all the time.
Go through your Steam/XBox/PSN list, and look at whether a) protagonist is male, and b) does it feature DiD?
For me:
Aliens Vs Predator: Y, Y
Amnesia: Y, N
Assassin's Creed: Y, N
Bastion: Y, N
Batman: Arkham Asylum: Y, Y
Beyond Good and Evil: N, ?
The Binding of Isaac: Y, N
Black Mesa: Y, N
Borderlands: n/a (3:1), N
CoD4: Y, Y
Chivalry: Y, N
CS: Y, N
Deus Ex: HR: Y, Y
Dragon Age II: n/a (1:1), Y
Skyrim: n/a (1:1), Y
Half-Life 2: Y, Y
Lara Croft &GoL: N, N
Left 4 Dead: n/a (3:1), N
Left 4 Dead 2: n/a (3:1), N
Limbo: Y, N
Metro 2033: Y, N
Metro Last Light: Y, Y
Monaco: n/a (3:1), Y
Monkey Island 1 & 2: Y, Y
Penny Arcade 1-2: n/a (1:1), N
Penny Arcade 3: Y, Y
PAYDAY: Y, N
Portal: N, N
Portal 2: N, Y
Prince of Persia 1-4: Y, N
RAGE: Y, N
STALKER: n/a (?), N
Sam & Max: Y, Y
Section 8: Y, N
Serious Sam 1-3: Y, N
TF2: Y, N
Terraria: n/a (1:1), N
Titan Quest: n/a (1:1), Y
To The Moon: n/a (1:1), N
Tomb Raider (Legend/Underworld): N, N
Tom Raider: N, Y
Torchlight: n/a (1:1), N
Vampire:tM: Bloodlines: n/a (1:1), Y
The Walking Dead: Y, Y
Witcher 2: Y, Y
You have good taste in games, Bethryn.
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spacekungfumanPoor and minority-filledRegistered User, __BANNED USERSregular
Bioshock Infinite was a game that addressed racism, colonialism, imperialism, American exceptionalism, the transition from becoming a girl to a woman, a young woman escaping an abusive relationship, and all sorts of progressive themes
Here is a visual representation of it's financial success:
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In its first week of release, BioShock Infinite was the best-selling game on Steam's digital Top 10 PC Charts.[215] In the United States, BioShock Infinite was the top-selling console game for March 2013, with more than 878,000 units sold; these figures do not include digital sales such as through Steam.[216] During the first week of sales in the United Kingdom, BioShock Infinite debuted as the number one selling PC game, and the best-selling game on all available formats, topping the UK PC Retail Sales and the UK All Formats video games charts.[215][217][218] In the game's opening week in the UK, its Xbox 360 version ranked #1, PlayStation 3 version ranked #2, and the PC version ranked #9 in the UK Individual Formats video games charts, due to 64 percent of its sales being on the Xbox 360, 31 percent on the PlayStation 3, and 5 percent on PC.[218] As of April 2, 2013, it is currently the second biggest launch of 2013 in the UK after Tomb Raider, and is the biggest UK game launch in the BioShock franchise's history with approximately 9000 more sales than BioShock 2.[217][218][219] During the game's second week in the UK, despite a 75 percent drop in sales, BioShock Infinite maintained its lead in the UK All Formats charts.[220] In its third week, Infinite became the first 2013 game to top the UK charts for three weeks in a row.[221] Take Two reported that the game has shipped 3.7 million copies to retail by their May 2013 financial report.[222]
So why is it that adding progressive elements to a game is a DEATH KNELL that will force the AMERICAN TAX PAYERS to OPEN THEIR WALLETS
I agree with you Cass, but if you look at how Bioshock Infinite was marketed it appears that Booker is the rugged male action hero saving poor elizabeth from being hanged by the angry villages and scary monsters
Basically I'm completely okay with Kevin Levine agreeing to mismarket the game to get it into more homes.
Edit: the problem is that even when they try to do gender neutral marketing they tend to suck at it because they still use focus groups of frat boys and the guys in the offices doing the marketing are almost all white males
It's like the car companies until recently never considered a female perspective when designing a car and are only now starting to figure out "hey all of our designers are white men but more than 50% of our customers are women this is a problem"
Sure, but it's not like the game went out and people went "THEY TRICKED US!" and threw a fit. It's also not like they put Elizabeth in the cover, leaning forward, tits out, being like "oh come rescue me from my tower wiiiiink"
I'm okay with Infinite's marketing. It hit a good medium, where it was widely appealing without being sexist claptrap, and the themes in the game weren't anathema once they were revealed - in fact, they strengthened the support of the game
If the gaming industry needs to do the equivalent of blending broccoli into the brownie mix, I'm ok with it.
This is literally what happened with Darklands. Here is the cover:
Here is the in game art:
This is literally what I was saying in the quote Quid sigged.
It was a pretty neat cover just for catching a person's eye, because back then the folks likely to be interested in Darklands were the types who played or at least knew of D&D and other RPGs (tabletop or video game) and... well, female characters like that were usually the way art went back in the early days of this sort of thing.
And then Darklands turns out to be a game that is essentially gender neutral (man/women can be whatever and are just as good as each other- I remember the playthrough I did with my Dad had a totally badass female warrior with a brass handgun who threw all our potions for us. she was rad as you can get), in additon to being an incredibly good game.
I miss Darklands. Should go play it again.
Exactly. The girl on the cover grabbed attention. The game was really progressive for the setting/time, and really really fucking good in general. If the cover got more gamers to play it, then I support that cover.
I think the vitriolic rejection against this talk on reddit is some weird assumption that the content they want to consume will stop existing if we get more tomb raider 2013's or bioshock infinites
and that's nonsense, diversifying the medium won't result in the end of male action hero saves the day games, its just maybe well get games that aren't that and it'd be swell
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ShivahnUnaware of her barrel shifter privilegeWestern coastal temptressRegistered User, Moderatormod
I thought games already conformed before they reached our shelves. Alterations like putting clothes on the naked statues in a Castlevania game or editing the colors of Oil Man from Mega Man or removing the Muslim prayer from Ocarina of Time's Fire Temple. Happens all the time.
Nintendo did a lot of censorship during localization*, but that's died down a bit.
*Final Fantasy VI has some great examples of clothes being added and religious and alcohol references being removed, to the point where the spell "holy" was renamed "Pearl."
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Accepting that gender is a thing that exists is sort of... non-third wave feminist. Except, it's actually accepting that gender is binary and that it is valuable for one to only display one set of traits.
It's a slightly complicated issue once you start wanting to account for and accept the needs of transgender people, while simultaneously saying that gender is a purely socially imposed standard.
edit:Bethryn did a good job of explaining this.
Don't.... don't make the same mistake I did.
In all seriousness though, the entire video itself was Exhibit A in the argument for why Anita's videos are necessary. I'd actually recommend this article for that reason as well; while Anita's videos may not be the perfect, she's one voice of (hopefully) many, and if the end result is more people talking about it then we are all better off.
But fuck the Amazing Atheist. He can shut up.
watching the amazing atheist and getting angry at him is exactly what he wants you to do
I can't rationalize how he feels so bitterly towards feminism while being so progressive on most issues, except that his feminism videos have a billion views so I think he's just doing what gets people to tune in and leave an angry comment against him or sexist comment in support of him
He's kind of like a leftist Rush Limbaugh. I like this comparison, because he's a lot like Rush Limbaugh
(Unless someone else can find it first)
Awww... how moe.
So, should there be some effort to segregate products of western culture and stuff that comes out of Japan? We have different tropes.
spoilered for creepy fucking box sex content
Woah, I just want to end discrimination, not demolish gender. I'd like to keep inherent traits around in my fantasy entertainment (and also I like your idea of environment guiding/forcing one's actions) because I take some comfort in the familiar. I say that as a straight, white male.
Sorry.
My point what the material you chose sexualizes adolescents, which is pretty fucking not good.
So the 'inherent' traits you speak of are just emergent traits that can easily be built by having a fairly typical society with the same problems as ours has.
It's not exactly the same problems, but the same expectations that'd build most of those traits. You can get societies with wildly different problems but some of the same gendered traits, or different traits with the same problems, based on who is expected to be like what.
They are being brought up, many times within this thread. She is not bringing them up in the videos, which is my current biggest gripe with the videos. Her failure to bring them up doesn't make the point any less valid. Those 3 examples are great example of how it should be done, however it is very rarely done like that. Those types of characters need to be made much more often.
Actually, while produced by a Japanese company, both of those series tend to focus more on Western iconography.
It is possible to simultaneously support the right of actual women to wear whatever they want, and ask the all-male creative team why every female character is an ardent nudist. Because actual women have actual motivations, whereas fictional people only act in the manner that their writers want them to act. If they act in a certain manner, it doesn't just reflect them, it reflects the writer.
So Power Girl is a cool superhero with some great runs of comics about her and some interesting characterization, but if anyone in the comic asks her "why do you have a big window on your costume showing off your cleavage" the actual answer is "because this is presumed to appeal to a primarily male readership." Because it's a decision made without regard to characterization.
On the other hand, if you asked why Jack from Mass Effect didn't wear a shirt, she could respond in-character with some sort of "fuck you! I'm too extreme for clothes! I have sweet tattoooooooooos!" and it would actually make some sense. Actually, I'm pretty sure you can ask her and that's her basic response.
You can even have in-between examples, like how She-Hulk spent the Byrne run complaining to him about her outfits and how it made no sense for a lawyer to fight in a purple swimsuit. Or Empowered, I guess.
Anyway, the point is that if you ignore the actual reason something has happened in order to fanwank about how it could be justified you're being silly.
Yeah, I know. You have to understand what Japanese gamer/anime culture is about to pick up on instantly. Little things like why that image you posted is composed the way it is. What is in the middle of the frame? what does the little pendant draw attention to? It is meant to appeal to male japanese ephebophile gamers attracted to not overtly sexual girls (moe).
It is pretty much the same sort of male gaze+fantasy fulfillment as if you had posted a girl with double-E breasts hanging out of a bikini, it just has a different audience.
It is specifically the audience that created most of the material you see when you image search for Atelier Ayesha with safesearch off, and it's actually officially encouraged by the extra content in things like box sets.
I thought the point of the series was to go over the rampant sexism, not to say "Hey, it's all good, we get some token female leads."
I think Lara Croft being cited as an example of a strong female lead is hilarious, btw, as she was basically T&A for years.
I'm telling you that she doesn't need to cherry pick. You can go on for hours and hours and hours naming different games that us the damsel in distress trope. In fact, she goes on for about a total of 48 minutes thus far doing it! I will agree that her videos suffer because she is not providing positive examples for people to build on, but that doesn't have a negative effect on the point she's trying to make, and the point that I am telling you right now: An extremely high number of games feature a damsel in distress, while an extremely low number feature a strong positive role model female hero.
FF13 and Mirror's Edge had great female leads, but those are just about the two exemplary ones. I'm sure you could sit there and think "well there's also X, and Y, and Z", you could do an exhaustive list of strong male vs strong female characters, and be surprised at how one-sided it is.
But it's a lot like Batman. For years, he was Adam West. Now he's the goddamn Batman.
Sure, and that's all well and good, and I love the new Tomb Raider, but if Lara Croft comes up, then the well isn't very deep, you know?
While it is somewhat proof that the pool is pretty shallow, that doesn't 2013 croft isn't a welcome addition to the party.
Newer iterations of the series have been better in the "lets make Lara act and feel like a human being with human interests and human goals, versus being pixelated tits on a stick" department than the games of yore (this is entirely thanks to Crystal Dynamics). They're still, admittedly, not that great at some of the other, more ethereal gender-related stuff, but they're essentially miles and away better at it than most who blatantly drag gender issues into their games.
I don't follow this last bit. Who's forcing culture on who? Do you mean Japan on the west? Or vice versa?
I don't even really understand this worry.
If traits are inherent, how can there be any danger of demolishing gendered traits?
And yeah, I think that if you build a reasonably plausible society, recognizable traits should show up, because they're a response to the environment.
It was a pretty neat cover just for catching a person's eye, because back then the folks likely to be interested in Darklands were the types who played or at least knew of D&D and other RPGs (tabletop or video game) and... well, female characters like that were usually the way art went back in the early days of this sort of thing.
And then Darklands turns out to be a game that is essentially gender neutral (man/women can be whatever and are just as good as each other- I remember the playthrough I did with my Dad had a totally badass female warrior with a brass handgun who threw all our potions for us. she was rad as you can get), in additon to being an incredibly good game.
I miss Darklands. Should go play it again.
Jack's aesthetic and personality is one of wholesale rejection of normality
Powergirl's boob window is because cleavage
Go through your Steam/XBox/PSN list, and look at whether a) protagonist is male, and b) does it feature DiD?
For me:
Amnesia: Y, N
Assassin's Creed: Y, N
Bastion: Y, N
Batman: Arkham Asylum: Y, Y
Beyond Good and Evil: N, ?
The Binding of Isaac: Y, N
Black Mesa: Y, N
Borderlands: n/a (3:1), N
CoD4: Y, Y
Chivalry: Y, N
CS: Y, N
Deus Ex: HR: Y, Y
Dragon Age II: n/a (1:1), Y
Skyrim: n/a (1:1), Y
Half-Life 2: Y, Y
Lara Croft &GoL: N, N
Left 4 Dead: n/a (3:1), N
Left 4 Dead 2: n/a (3:1), N
Limbo: Y, N
Metro 2033: Y, N
Metro Last Light: Y, Y
Monaco: n/a (3:1), Y
Monkey Island 1 & 2: Y, Y
Penny Arcade 1-2: n/a (1:1), N
Penny Arcade 3: Y, Y
PAYDAY: Y, N
Portal: N, N
Portal 2: N, Y
Prince of Persia 1-4: Y, N
RAGE: Y, N
STALKER: n/a (?), N
Sam & Max: Y, Y
Section 8: Y, N
Serious Sam 1-3: Y, N
TF2: Y, N
Terraria: n/a (1:1), N
Titan Quest: n/a (1:1), Y
To The Moon: n/a (1:1), N
Tomb Raider (Legend/Underworld): N, N
Tom Raider: N, Y
Torchlight: n/a (1:1), N
Vampire:tM: Bloodlines: n/a (1:1), Y
The Walking Dead: Y, Y
Witcher 2: Y, Y
This was skipping a few where it didn't make much sense, but what we see here is the following:
Of 54 games:
34 had male protagonists
7 had female protagonists
13 had a choice of sex (mostly 1:1, but in 4 cases a ratio of 3 male options to 1 female)
18 had Damsels in Distress in them.
Being critical of another's culture sets a serious and dangerous precedent? You may want to try telling the Japanese that.
Besides, there isn't anything wrong with being critical of another country or culture. You yourself have been very critical of Canada's culture in the past, if I remember correctly. We may not agree with you, but no one has been so crass as to say you aren't permitted to be critical of Canada.
Those games are very popular in the west. Gaming and anime culture isn't limited to Japan, it's an international element so when progressives discover its existence in the west they're going to clash with its conservative flaws.
Nothing groundbreaking here. Foreign cultures will judge one another, they're no getting around that.
You have good taste in games, Bethryn.
Exactly. The girl on the cover grabbed attention. The game was really progressive for the setting/time, and really really fucking good in general. If the cover got more gamers to play it, then I support that cover.
and that's nonsense, diversifying the medium won't result in the end of male action hero saves the day games, its just maybe well get games that aren't that and it'd be swell
Nintendo did a lot of censorship during localization*, but that's died down a bit.
*Final Fantasy VI has some great examples of clothes being added and religious and alcohol references being removed, to the point where the spell "holy" was renamed "Pearl."